13 out of 13 people found this review helpful.
It's like a new religion. It will change the way watch TV
Date of Review: Jun 23, 2004
The Bottom Line: Stop debating, just go out and get one already. It will be your favorite appliance hands down.
TiVo is simply one of the best designed products ever made. Not only is it incredibly easy to use but it is such a joy to use. It will instantly become a necessity in your life. Once you have TiVo you will never have to watch a commercial you don t want to, and you will never have to channel surf again.
Pros:
- User Interface: This UI is a standard to which all others should be judged. Everything is easy to read and presented in a very digestible fashion. You will never really run into information overload. TiVo is very light on the technical jargon and is generally presented in simple everyday language. The feedback is flawless. Everything that you do in TiVo gives you great feedback so you are never wondering if you didn t do something right. The popping sound when you fast forward will at times having you imitate it because it s so satisfying to hear as you zip past a commercial (very Pavlovian).
- Design: The TiVo box is about the size of most digital cable boxes and is very easy to hook up. The ports on the back are labeled with thick black lettering making it easy to see. If your cable box supports it, I highly recommend you use an S-video connection as it will make everything look better. TiVo is also very durable, so you can stack a VCR and a cable box on top of it without worry.
- Service: Service and support from TiVo is excellent. They will never leave you in the dark.
- The Remote: The problem with the TiVo remote is that it spoils all others. This is easily the best remote I have ever used. Very comfortable, excellent tactile feedback, well balanced. You can control your TV also so your TiVo viewing can be handled exclusively by one remote.
- Expandable: Tivo is adding new features all the time. This fall they are adding the ability to back up programs to your PC and even burn them onto DVDs. It also has a USB port which you can connect a network or WiFi adapter too.
- Value: TiVo is easily worth the price, and so is the subscription fee. My advice is to pony up the $300 dollars right away for life time subscription rather than pay the $13 monthly subscription.
Cons:
- The bummer about TiVo is that it isn't exactly up with digital tech. No Component video in our out, no Optical audio in or out. This basically means that if you have an HDTV, anything you watch on TiVo won't be High Def. TiVo is coming out with an HD version but it's for satellite only.
- Their networking support isn t all that great. Out of the box most TiVo's won't support using a network so if you don't have a telephone line, you have to bring it over to a friend that does to set it up. You will get a software update as soon as you connect that will add network support. Also if you plan on using WiFi you better be careful. They don t support 802.11g yet and have limited support for WiFi adapters. This will likely corrected with a software update in the future.
- My biggest beef is actually a major con against them and it s why I can t give it a full five stars. This is going to get a bit technical but I will try to KIS. TiVo is basically a Linux box running a proprietary operating system. In other words TiVo is a computer that just records TiVo shows onto a hard drive. TiVo uses standard IDE hard drives that you can get at Best Buy or Comp USA. This is to cut down on manufacturing costs. The problem is that a TiVo runs 24/7, it never stops running ever. Hard Drives haven t been built to run like that for years. What this means is that the TiVo hard drive will eventually die. This manifests in different ways and it s impossible to tell you how long it will take. A friend of mine had a TiVo series 2 that died inside of a year, but another has had one for 3 years now and hasn t had a problem. I had a Series 1 TiVo that died after a year so I can speak from experience. Luckily I know my way around computer hardware so I was able to change the hard drive for a bigger one, thanks in large part to the glorious TiVo forums (http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/). The great part about this was that I was able to make my 20 hour TiVo into an 80 hour TiVo with about an hours work. For this reason I recommend only the 40 hour unit unless you have money to burn. I watch a lot of TV and I rarely run out of room. Let me stress that this is not a reason not to buy the TiVo. I know that TiVo will repair it for a fee and if you have a tech savy friend you can have them fix it easy. Should your hard drive die just think of it as a way to get a TiVo with twice the recording time.
Meijer
